The driver’s seat in my wife’s Ford Flex has started cracking and splitting along the edge. The seams are in good shape but the material itself is failing. Anyone have experience with a repair kit? Any recommendations?

You get what you pay for...So keep in mind how much you paid for this advice.

If its leather, the repair kits like 3M will work, but only temporarily before another area fails.

Best thing is just to replace the cover. They're not terribly hard to do. I did the whole interior on my TL with a kit from Auto Custom Leathers. He'll ship the cover to you and even include the hog ring tools if you need them. Good dude to do business with, and he will sell you just the cover you need (no need to buy an entire kit).

We're going all the way back forty years here. Back when they had get rich magazines with various spiels. I had some old beater with an upholstery split and didn't do a very good job with a JC Whitney kit. Purchased a new '79 Renault LeCar-- vinyl but nice French vinyl. Back in those days, the only thing the French could do right was seats. Some miscreant cut a hole out of the upholstery on my month old car. Took it to one of these vinyl repair gurus operating out of his house and he repaired it flawlessly. Matched color and grain perfectly. Long time ago and I'm sure he's long dead, but I was pleased with his work.

Right now it’s just a couple of small spots. I’m sure it will get worse with time but it’s nowhere near new seat cover time. The edges of the seat are vinyl and just this portion seems to have hardened.

Anyone ever used one of those kits?

You get what you pay for...So keep in mind how much you paid for this advice.

Right now it’s just a couple of small spots. I’m sure it will get worse with time but it’s nowhere near new seat cover time. The edges of the seat are vinyl and just this portion seems to have hardened.

Anyone ever used one of those kits?

Yes, in my Accord. It fixes the hole but then the leather/vinyl tends to tear around the fix as the stress gets concentrated there.

Right now it’s just a couple of small spots. I’m sure it will get worse with time but it’s nowhere near new seat cover time. The edges of the seat are vinyl and just this portion seems to have hardened.

Anyone ever used one of those kits?

Yes, in my Accord. It fixes the hole but then the leather/vinyl tends to tear around the fix as the stress gets concentrated there.

You are confirming my suspicions, the material is failing so patching is just that, a patch. I’m mostly thinking of damage control to make it less snaggy and to slow the rate of failure. I was more curious about experiences with particular kits and if they look decent when done with a modicum of care. Or would I be better off just glueing down the splits until total failure.

You get what you pay for...So keep in mind how much you paid for this advice.

I would get some coarse material and some fabric glue (contact cement) and push the material under the split, coat both halves with glue, let it set and then stick it together. That's probably about the best hope you have of slowing the damage.